


it was death by a thousand cuts

by tophsgf



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Bending (Avatar TV), Bisexual Sokka (Avatar), Bittersweet Ending, Lesbian Toph Beifong, M/M, Old Hollywood - Freeform, Period-Typical Homophobia, gay Zuko, it's an evelyn hugo au, this is embarassingly unedited, zukka - Freeform, zuko is not ooc i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:41:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26230573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tophsgf/pseuds/tophsgf
Summary: “Who was the love of your life?”Zuko’s anger vanishes, leaving a clear sadness in its wake. He meets Korra’s eyes, expression nearly unreadable. “It was Sokka Naquier.”Oh. Okay, yeah, she did not expect this. Maybe she should have, but it goes against literally everything she’s been told about Zuko Huo, nothing any magazine has ever written has ever even implied-She’s thinking too hard, clearly. “Six wives,” Zuko says, tone dull, “and I’m gay. Truly a feat, isn't it?”“You’re gay?”Zuko ignores her embarrassing statement of the obvious. “I spent my whole life loving him."
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong/Suki, i did not mean to tag toph/sokka i swear
Comments: 93
Kudos: 468
Collections: A:tla, fire lilies (zukka)





	1. if the story's over

**Author's Note:**

> for snig.  
> you know those books that are like . . pride and prejudice reworked but are basically just the writing barely altered to fit different characters? that's pretty much what this is, and a lot of the language is just an altered version of what's in the book it's based on. so, yeah. that's my little disclaimer. this also isn't the full plot, cause i'm waaaay too lazy for that.

_Korra is twenty-three when she gets the journalism assignment that changes her life. Hugo, her editor, calls her in, looking thoroughly impressed (a rare sight, to be sure)._

_“So,” he says. “Seems as though your work precedes you.” It definitely doesn’t. She’s written like four puff pieces and one serious character study that didn’t get taken seriously by anyone. Not even her girlfriend had it in her to pretend it was stellar writing._

_“Uh, sir?” Hugo looks at her like she should know what he’s asking of her. She has absolutely no clue._

_“In our next edition,” her editor starts, as if he’s preparing to go into a dramatic monologue, “will have an interview with Zuko. His first one in decades.”_

_Zuko. Old Hollywood movie star. Famously reclusive in the present, but in the golden era of film he was famous for his notorious public relationships. Six wives. Most famous of them being Toph Beifong, an heiress turned Hollywood producer, and Katara Naqi, who it was rumoured he married only to spur his former co-star, Sukko Naquier, her brother. At least, that’s what Korra remembers. She doesn’t know much about him besides the fact that he’s known for the scar that covers half his face, and he’s still very attractive, even for an elderly man. She’s not ashamed to admit it._

_Clearly, she’s been silent too long, because Hugo clears his throat._

_“That’s very impressive,” she jumps to fill the silence, “but what does it have to do with-”_

_“There’s a catch. He’ll only agree to the interview if you’re the one who interviews him.”_

_“Me?” Her? The most underwhelming journalist of the 21st century?_

_“You,” Hugo says, clearly annoyed by her confusion. “He likes the way you write, that’s what his assistant said. Something about having an inner power.” An inner power to bore people to sleep, sure, yeah. She’s a natural. “He wants you to meet him tomorrow at his penthouse. Something about making sure you’re the right fit. I told his assistant you’d be there.”_

_“Okay,” Korra starts, “but-”_

_“You’re dismissed. Watch his movies, prep for tomorrow. I don’t think you need me to tell you how much is riding on you.” He isn’t wrong. She knows that she can’t fuck this up._

_She’s at Zuko’s early the next morning, hands only slightly shaky. Holy fuck. Asami nearly shrieked when Korra had told her, apparently a huge fan of Zuko. Clearly, this is a weirdly big deal._

_Surprisingly, no assistant greets her when she enters the foyer. Instead, she’s met with the sight of Zuko, looking older than the last pictures she’d seen of him (admittedly taken about ten years ago), his amber eyes piercing into her soul. Korra thinks she’s stuttered some sort of greeting, but there’s circus music playing so loudly inside her head that she could be wrong._

_“You must be Korra,” Zuko says, in lieu of a greeting. He doesn’t seem to be one to mince words. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”_

_“Ditto,” she manages, though it sounds slightly strangled. She didn’t prepare for him to be this intimidating. “Though I’ll admit I have no idea why you requested me.”_

_Something flashes in Zuko’s good eye, maybe regret? It’s gone too quickly for Korra to fully process it. “I’m sure,” is all Zuko says. He offers no further explanation. “I lied to your editor.”_

_“Pardon?” Spirits, Hugo is going to be so pissed._

_“I don’t want you to interview me.” Of course he doesn’t. She’s a shoddy interviewer at best, and a downright disgraceful one at worst. “I want you to write my biography. Publish it after I’m dead, make as much money as you can.”_

_“What?” She can’t believe what she’s hearing. It doesn’t make any fucking sense. Zuko wants her to sell his secrets to the highest bidder? “Why would you-”_

_Zuko keeps going, ignoring her clear reservations. “I will tell you everything. Everyone I love is dead, there’s no point in harbouring my secrets any longer.”_

_“Um,” Korra says, the picture of eloquence. “Okay.”_

_Zuko looks pleased at her response, nodding to an open door to their left. “That’s my study. We can do it there. And we’ll start with my first wife. Mai.”_

_And with that, he begins. No attempt to reassure Korra. She decides then that she likes him._

Zuko was eighteen when he realized he wouldn’t survive much longer if he lived with his father. Clearly. His mother was long gone, left in a cloud of whispered goodbyes and abandonment issues, and his sister was…. Well, Azula was born lucky, and she was lucky enough to trick some poor idiot into marrying her. She was sixteen when she left. So he found a way out. Proposed to a girl in the apartment complex he and his father lived in, Mai. She was not particularly nice, but she didn't flinch when she looked at his scar and she had got a fire in her eyes, a need to escape her situation. And that was enough for him. 

She unenthusiastically accepted the proposal, and he was out of the slums like that. With his saved money (some stolen from his father, he won’t lie) and the money from Mai’s work as a secretary, they got an apartment in a suburb of LA, one close enough to the movie lots. Mai didn’t comment on the location besides lamenting about its lack of proximity to a library. They were not exactly the picture of newly wedded bliss. 

He knew he wanted to be in movies. Even if he was slightly awkward and definitely not someone people want to look at — he was determined to succeed.

So he faked his way in. It doesn’t work at first, the open castings, the forced meetings with execs. But then he met Toph, an up-and-coming producer, ambitious enough to want to make a name for herself.

They clicked pretty much instantly, and for once, he was lucky. She was incredibly clever, and ruthless in a way that he had never experienced before. Toph wasn’t like Azula, she’s wary of the consequences that others may face for her actions.

Despite her being a year younger than him, Zuko thought he could probably learn a lot from the blind producer with the razor sharp wit.

Toph was looking for success, and Zuko knew he'd bring that. Even if he had to play the mediocre minor antagonist roles until he got a good part. 

Mai, as far as wives go, wasn’t very involved in his life. They lived separately, save from sleeping in the same bed at night. She had no obligation to him, Zuko had no obligation to her. It was a bizarre arrangement, but it worked. 

Until it didn’t, until Toph informed him that the executives wanted him to be seen with someone more famous, someone who could jump start his career. And that’s how he was introduced to Ty Lee.

Mai didn’t cry when he told her he was leaving her. She just gazed at him coldly, eyes unreadable. Told him that the road he’s chosen to walk is paved with loneliness. That it doesn’t matter if he wants a better life for himself. His emptiness will never go away. 

He didn’t realize how right she was until years later. And by then, it was way too fucking late. 

_“Did you love her?” Korra can’t help asking him, trying to read Zuko’s serene expression, contradicted only by the fire in his eyes._

_“In a way, yes,” Zuko shakes his head, as if he’s waking from a daze. “But I think I was more grateful to her than anything else. She helped me before I could help myself.”_

_“Who was the love of your life?” That is the question of all this, isn’t it? Six wives. Which one was his soulmate? She figures it was Toph, because of the way people talk about them. Like they’re the greatest hollywood tragedy. Toph or not, it’s going to be the question everyone wants to ask. So she has to know._

_“Ask me that tomorrow and I’ll answer. But not right now.” Zuko doesn’t look upset at the inquiry, just tired. Like he hopes this is the last time anyone will ask._

_So they go on to Ty Lee._

Ty Lee was known for playing damsels in distress, the circus girl turned ingénue. She was a rising star, with an Oscar nomination under her belt. 

“I like your scar,” she told him one day, as they pretended to be in love for the paparazzis’ benefit. “It’s like it’s a part of you.”

“It is a part of me.” 

“You know what I mean.” He didn’t, though, said as much to Toph when she met him in the lobby of Sunset Studios’ Exec building the next day.

“You’re an idiot.” Toph looked at him like he’s the stupidest man alive. “She was trying to flirt with you.” 

“With me?” Why? Ty Lee had no reason to want him wrapped around her delicate finger, she’s far more prominent in Hollywood than he was, and she had a face that makes people want to cast her. Like she would solve all your problems just by being in your life. 

“She likes you. Probably against her better judgement.” Toph blew a loose hair off her forehead. “Most girls tend to find you quite attractive, you know,” 

“Okay,” Zuko said.

Zuko doesn’t have to look at her to know she’s smiling. “Zuko,” she said. “I think they’re gonna give you Arthur.”

King Arthur. A role he’s been yearning to play. Not the villain, the hero. “Toph-”

“But I’m not going to bullshit you, Zuko. Zhao is never going to approve you for that part.”

“Why not?”

“You’re not the right type.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“No one would believe someone would choose another man over you. They’ve built you up as a heartthrob.”

“I can assure you, many people have chosen another man over me. I could pull it off.”

“You could not.”

“Why?”

“Because the movie needs someone equally as heartthrob-y.”

“I could be less heartthrob-y!”

Toph looked at him.

He tried harder. “I want it, Toph. And you know I can do it. I’m one of the most interesting actors you have right now.”

Toph laughed. “You’re bold. I’ll give you that. And it’s not that you won’t get cast. You will. Zhao will get wrestled out. But not without a compromise. Which is the promise that they’re casting Sokka Naquier as Lancelot.”

Sokka Naquier. 

He was going to ruin everything. 

_“Everything?” Korra responds, brow furrowed. “Did you really hate him that much?”_

_Zuko just looks at her, eyes almost imperceptibly sad. “I’m tired now. We can continue tomorrow.”_

_Korra can’t bring herself to listen to music on the train home, Zuko’s words echoing in her head._

_When she’s back in her apartment, she watches clips of Zuko in Camelot, Pride and Prejudice, We Were Here , and C’est La Vie . She watches the GIF of him coming out of the water in Pride and Prejudice so many times that when she falls asleep, it’s stuck in her head. Like she’s there, the sun gleaming off of Zuko's dark hair, clinging to the sides of his face._

_Between the hours of 11PM. and 2AM, while the rest of the world is sleeping, Korra’s shitty laptop flickers with the sight of Zuko, and the sound of his voice filling her living room._

_There is no denying that he's stunningly beautiful. People often talk about his straight, thick eyebrows (eyebrow?) and his dark hair, but Korra can’t take her eyes off his bone structure. His jawline is strong, his cheekbones are high, and all of it comes to a point at the scar that covers his left eye. She knows enough about Hollywood in that era to know that such an unconventional feature had probably never been seen before on the big screen. If she’s being honest, it’s never really been seen since._

_There’s this expression Zuko has, one he was famous for. It’s a sort of icy neutrality, where the only warmth is in his golden eyes. Korra has never seen anything like it. How does he know just how much to give and just how much of himself to withhold?_

_“Camelot turned out to be a carrot dangled in front of me,” Zuko says, as they sit in his study the next day, only the sound of rain as a backdrop. “Because as soon as I became “Zuko, romantic lead,”_

Sunset had all sorts of movies they wanted him to do. Dumb sentimental comedy stuff. He was okay with it for two reasons. One, he had no choice but to be all right with it because he didn’t hold the cards, and it would be idiotic to turn down the opportunities. And two, his star was rising.

He didn’t love Ty Lee, but he liked her. She had that wide-eyed innocence that people underestimate, and Zuko respected her for it. That and the fact that, at least at first, Ty Lee treated him like a person. There are people who see a beautiful flower and rush over to pick it. They want to hold it in their hands, they want to own it. They want the flower’s beauty to be theirs, to be within their possession, their control. Ty Lee wasn’t like that. At least, not at first. 

Ty Lee was happy to be near the flower, to look at the flower, to appreciate the flower simply being. Here’s the thing about marrying a girl like that—a girl like Ty Lee, back then. You’re saying to her, “This beautiful thing you've been happy to simply appreciate, well, now it’s yours to own. Forever.” And that’s hard to come back from. Especially when you love the flower far more than it loves you. 

“Zuko, I’m serious,” Toph said one afternoon in her office when the two of them were sharing a drink. “I’ve had it up to my eyeballs with this Ty Lee talk.” Zuko visited Toph about once a day back then, just to check in, see how she was doing. He always made it seem like business, but even then he knew she was the closest thing he had to a friend.

Sure, Zuko had become friendly with a lot of the other actors at Sunset. Jet, in particular, was a favourite of his. He was tall and athletic, with a dynamite laugh and an air of detachment to him. He never minced words but he could charm the pants off almost anybody. Sometimes he and Jet, and some of the other actors on the lot, would grab lunch and talk about various goings-on, but, in all honesty, he would have thrown every single one of them in front of a moving train to get a part. And he knew they would have done the same to him. Intimacy is impossible without trust. And they would have been idiots to trust one another.

But Toph was different.

“How come you never tried anything?” Zuko asked her. “We’ve known each other a few years now. Not even a kiss on the cheek.”

“I’ll kiss you on the cheek if you want,” Toph said, smiling. They were standing by the bar, sharing an after-wedding drink. He would have spoken more about the wedding itself, on the events which lead up to it, but with Ty Lee, it’s easier to dwell on other things. 

“Not what I mean, and you know it.”

“Did you want something to happen?” She asked him, pale eyes shining.

Zuko wasn’t attracted to Toph Beifong. Despite the fact that she was a categorically attractive woman. 

“No,” Zuko said. “I don’t think I did.”

“But you wanted me to want something to happen?”

Zuko grinned. “And what if I did? Is that so wrong? I’m an actor, Toph. Don’t you forget that.”

Toph laughed. “You have ‘actor’ ingrained in your voice. I remember it every single day.”

“Then why, Toph? What’s the truth?”

Toph took a sip of her martini and took her arm off him. “It’s hard to explain.”

“Try.”

She looked thoughtful. “It’s a long and complicated story. But suffice it to say, you’ve just never been my type.”

The way she said it, Zuko knew she was trying to tell him something. Toph wasn’t interested in men like him. Toph wasn’t interested in men at all.

“You’re my best friend in the world, Toph,” he said. “Do you know that?” Toph grinned. 

Zuko got the impression she did so because she was relieved. She’d revealed herself, however vaguely. And he was meeting her with acceptance, however indirectly.

“Am I really?” she asked.

Zuko nodded.

“Well, then, you’ll be mine.”

And they were. Toph and Zuko both wanted the same thing. 

Success.

He and Ty Lee, however, did not want the same things. Because she wanted a husband who could love her, and he would never be that husband. They married to please the press, or he had, at least, and their happiness stopped after the wedding -- had stopped when Ty Lee began to recognize the distinct clash of their respective intentions. He got what he wanted. Ty Lee got nothing but an empty mansion and a man who couldn’t love her the way she loved him. They fought constantly, to the point where not even concealer could cover the bags under his eyes, nights of restless arguments. 

That’s the part he was stuck in, the part where you accept the fight is over because it’s easier than addressing the root of the problem, where you know you’re holding someone back but you don’t know how to let go, when Toph Beifong came to his dressing room and told him the good news. Camelot was getting the green light. “It’s you as King Arthur, Suki Chen as Guinevere, Jet Li as Merlin, and Sokka Naquier as Lancelot.” 

“Sokka Naquier? From Olympian Studios?” He remembers, of course. Doesn’t make it any less irritating.

Toph nodded. “What’s with the frown? It’s not like that’s a surprise. I thought you’d be thrilled they finally green-lit your knight fantasy.”

“Oh,” Zuko said, turning further toward her. “I am. I absolutely am.”

“You don’t like Sokka Naquier?” 

Zuko smiled at her. “That asshole is gonna act me under the table.” 

Toph threw her head back and laughed. Sokka Naquier had made headlines earlier in the year. At the age of nineteen, he played a young and reckless soldier in a war-period piece. Everyone said he was sure to be nominated for an Oscar the next year. Exactly the sort of person the studio would want playing Lancelot. Exactly the sort of person he and Jet despised.

“They’re starting filming in two weeks, Zuko. Get your shit together.” 

Two weeks later, he was on the set of Camelot. The soundstage had been turned into a rustic castle, complete with suits of armour on the make-believe walls. 

But on the first day of rehearsals, as he and Jet hung out by hair and makeup and drank coffee, it became clear that Sokka Naquier had absolutely no idea how much they all hated him.

“Oh, God,” he said, coming up to Jet and him. “I’m so scared.”

He was wearing gray trousers and a deep blue sweater. He had an open, boy-next-door sort of face. Big, round, pale blue eyes, long lashes, soft lips, dark brown hair, cut neatly at his chin. He was perfect. Zuko was aware that his beauty was more along the lines of the flawed sort of stunning, more to be captivated by than to yearn for, and Jet was an aggressive sort of pretty. But Sokka Naquier was the sort of beautiful you wished you could marry, that you almost could, if you played your cards right. 

And he and Jet were both aware of the danger of that sort of power. 

“What are you scared of?” Jet said.

“I have no idea what I’m doing.” 

Now, Zuko had seen Sokka’s film, and the few comedies he had done before that. There was absolutely no way this kid didn’t know what he was doing. “You can’t expect us to fall for that.” 

He looked at Zuko. And the way he did it made me feel as if no one had ever really looked at him before. Not even Ty Lee. “That hurts my feelings,” he said. Zuko actually felt a pang of regret. But he certainly wasn’t going to let on. 

“I didn’t mean anything by it,” Zuko said. 

“Yes, you absolutely did,” Sokka said. “I think you’re a bit of a cynic.” At this point, Jet was long gone. Probably off to flirt with Suki -- definitely to get away from this interaction. 

“I just have a hard time believing a man the entire town is saying will be nominated next year is doubting his ability to play Lancelot. It’s the most powerful role in the whole thing.” 

“If it’s such a sure thing, then why didn’t you take it?” He asked Zuko.

“I’m not pretty enough, Sokka. But thank you for that.” 

Sokka smirked, and Zuko realized he’d played right into his hands. 

That’s when he started to take a liking to Sokka Naquier.

_“I need a break,” Zuko says. “Have you thought about what you’ll do with the money?”_

_“The money?”_

_Zuko looks at her with a raised eyebrow. “From this book. You’ll be getting all of it.”_

_“All of it?”_

_“You’re going to publish this when I’m dead, Korra. And you’re going to sell it to the highest bidder. Don’t let your magazine try to convince you to stay with them. You don’t owe them anything.”_

_“Not to be morbid,” Korra grimaces, “but, uh, when do you expect all that to happen?”_

_“Soon.” Zuko says. He doesn’t sound upset by it. “Okay. We can start up again.”_

_He doesn't give Korra a chance to process the acceptance in his voice before he begins speaking again._

The next day, when Camelot shooting broke for lunch, Sokka caught his eye. “There’s no chance you’d want to cut out and grab a milkshake, is there?” he asked.

Ten minutes later, they were in Sokka’s baby-blue 1956 Chevy, making their way to Hollywood Boulevard. Sokka was a terrible driver, an absolute menace on the road. That never really changed, as the years passed. 

As they pulled into the diner’s parking lot and Zuko emerged from the car, he felt the need to put Sokka in his place. “Sokka, if you’re going to be as big as you clearly want to be, you need to learn two things.”

“And what are they?”

“First, you have to push people’s boundaries and not feel bad about it. No one is going to give you anything if you don’t ask for it. You're going to try. You're going to be told no. Get over it.” 

“And the second thing?” Sokka opened the car door, following Zuko as he entered the diner and ordered a milkshake.

“When you use people, be good at it.”

“I wasn’t trying to use you—” 

“Yes, Sokka, you were. And I’m fine with that. I wouldn’t have a moment’s hesitation in using you. And I wouldn’t expect you to have a second thought about using me. Do you know the difference between the two of us?”

“There are a lot of differences between the two of us.”

“Do you know the one in particular I’m talking about?” Zuko said.

  
“What is it?” 

“That I know I use people. I’m fine with the idea of using people. And all of that energy that you spend trying to convince yourself that you’re not using people I spend getting better at it.” 

“And you’re proud of that?” 

“I’m proud of where it’s gotten me.” It wasn’t a lie. Everything he had, he had worked for. In some way or another. 

“Are you using me right now?” Sokka’s expression is shockingly earnest, all usual cockiness evaporated. 

“No.” Zuko said, surprising himself by how quickly he responded. 

“Well, that’s a relief. And don’t give me the whole ‘you don’t have anything to offer’ spiel, because I’ve heard it before.” 

Zuko laughed, a real one, so unlike the forcedness with Ty Lee. Sokka would go on to win more Oscars than anybody else in their circle back then. And it was always for intense, dramatic roles. But Zuko always thought he’d be dynamite in a comedy. He was so quick. So effortlessly brilliant. The kind of wit most people would kill for.

“And anyways, I don’t think it’s true,” Sokka said, taking a sip of his milkshake. “You’re more famous than I am, of course. But I’m a better actor than you.”

“How would you know?” He wasn’t offended by the statement. It was probably true. 

Sokka’s eyes went comically wide, as if he was caught in some sort of trap. “I’ve seen them all,” he said finally. “I like you.”

Zuko looked at him sideways. 

Sokka just laughed, immediately recovered. “I know that’s probably not something most actors mean in this town, but I don’t want to be like most actors. I really like you. I like watching you on-screen. I like how the moment you show up in a scene, I can’t look at anything else. I like the way your hair frames your scar, the way you command a scene without even speaking. And to be honest, I like how calculating and awful you kind of are.” 

“I am not awful!”

“Walking around bragging about how you use people? Just terrible. But I really like it when you talk about it. I like how honest you are, how unashamed.” That description, it didn’t sound like Zuko. It sounded like Azula. He took a sip of his milkshake to conceal his shaking hands. 

“This laundry list of compliments seems to have a lot of insults in it,” He managed.

Sokka nodded, as if he was suddenly aware of where he was. “You know what you want, and you go after it. Not many people do it so earnestly. I’d like to be your friend. I'd like us to look out for each other.”

Zuko considered him. “So what, then? We choose to spend time together and try to be there for one another?”

Sokka looked as though he was about to laugh. “Have you ever had a real friend?” 

“I have a real friend.”

“Who is it?”

“Toph Beifong. She’s my best friend.”

“Well, fine,” Sokka said, putting out his hand for Zuko to shake. “I will be your second-best friend, next to Toph Beifong.” 

Zuko took his hand and shook it firmly. “Fine. Tomorrow I’ll take you to a diner with actual photographers. And afterward, we can rehearse together.”

The night after shooting for Camelot finished, Ty Lee was filming on location, Toph was busy but wouldn’t say with what, which Zuko knew meant she was seeing someone. And he wanted to celebrate.

So Sokka came over to his house and they split a bottle of overly expensive wine.

_“I can’t do this.” Zuko says suddenly, and Korra feels all the air leave the room._

_“What are you talking about?”_

_“I can’t tell you all of it, not yet.”_

_“Why not?”_

_“Don’t ask me that,” Zuko snaps, his eyes nearly glowing in the grey light of the rain._

_“Who was the love of your life?”_

_Zuko’s anger vanishes, leaving a clear sadness in its wake. He meets Korra’s eyes, expression nearly unreadable. “Sokka Naquier.”_

_Oh. Okay, yeah, she did not expect this. Maybe she should have, but it goes against literally everything she’s been told about Zuko, nothing any magazine has ever written has ever even implied-_

_She’s thinking too hard, clearly. “Six wives,” Zuko says, tone dull, “and I’m gay. Truly a feat, isn’t it?”_

_“You’re gay?”_

_Zuko ignores her embarrassing statement of the obvious. “I’ll tell you the whole story one day, Korra. But today, all I can tell you is how it started and how it ended.”_

Zuko was standing in the middle of Zhao’s mansion in the heart of Beverly Hills. Ty Lee had excused herself quickly, citing some need to powder her nose. He looked for Sokka, but couldn’t find him. Instead, he was surrounded by ass-kissing B-listers, hoping to rub elbows with him while they drank their overly alcoholic cocktails and spoke at length about the great medium of film. 

“Oh, there you are, Zuko,” Jet said, finding him in Zhao’s enormous hallway. 

He had two red cocktails in his hand. His voice was lukewarm, a bit hard to read. 

“Having a good night?” Zuko asked. 

He looked over his shoulder, put the stems of both glasses in one hand, and then pulled Zuko by the elbow, spilling as he did. 

“Ow, Jet,” he said, not bothering to hide his irritation. Jet simply nodded covertly to the laundry room to the right of them. 

“What on earth?” Zuko said. 

“Would you just open the goddamn door, Zuko?” He turned the handle, and Jet stepped in and dragged him in. He shut the door behind them.

“Here,” he said, handing Zuko one of the cocktails in the dark. 

“I was getting it for Suki, but you have it. It matches your suit, anyway.”

As his eyes adjusted, Zuko took the drink from him. “You’re lucky it matches my suit. You nearly poured half the drink on it.” 

With one of his hands now free, Jet tugged on the pull chain of the light above them. The tiny room lit up, a harsh glow. 

“What the fuck is going on with you, Jet?”

“You think I’m worried about what you think of me, Zuko? Now, listen, what’re we going to do?” 

“What are we going to do about what?”

“You are many things, but you’re not stupid. What are we going to do about Sokka Naquier?”

“He gave a great performance. What can we do?” Sokka would win an Oscar for his role as Lancelot, Zuko already knew that. Jet simply had to come to terms with it as well.

“This is not the Zuko I know and respect,” Jet said. Honestly, Zuko knew Jet didn’t really respect him. 

“Shut up.” 

Jet downed his drink. “People have been saying all sorts of things about the two of you, and I didn’t believe it. But now I don’t know.”

“People have been saying all sorts of things like what?”

“You know.” 

“I assure you, I haven’t the faintest.” 

“Why do you make things so difficult?” 

“Jet, you’ve pulled me into a laundry room against my will, and you’re shrieking at me about things I can’t control. I’m not the difficult one.”

“He’s gay, Zuko.” 

The minute Jet said that, it was as if everything around Zuko stopped. He couldn’t even focus on what Jet was saying, something about Sokka being _confused_ and _twisted_ and-

“You should probably get a handle on your wife, by the way. She’s in Zhao’s bedroom making out with some studio exec.” 

When Jet said it, Zuko did not think, _Oh, my God. My wife is cheating on me._ He thought, _I have to find Sokka._

With that bombshell, Jet left him there. In the cold glow of the laundry room. Zuko needed to go back to the party. But he stood there, frozen, thinking. He couldn’t turn the doorknob. He couldn’t do anything.

And then the door opened on its own. Sokka. The chaos of the party behind him.

“Zuko, what are you doing?” 

“How did you find me?” 

“I ran into Jet, and he said I could find you drinking in the laundry room. I thought it was a euphemism.” 

“It wasn’t.”

“I can see that.”

“Do you sleep with men?” Zuko asked.

Sokka, shocked, shut the door behind him. “What are you talking about?” 

“Jet says you’re gay.” 

Sokka looked over Zuko’s shoulder, brilliantly blue eyes fixating on the wall. 

“Who cares what Jet says?” 

“Are you?” 

“Are you going to stop being friends with me now? Is that what this is about?” 

“No,” Zuko said, shaking his head. “Of course not. I would never do that. Never.” 

“What, then?” 

“I just want to know is all.” 

“Why?” 

“Don’t you think I have the right to know?” 

“Depends.” 

“So you are?” Zuko asked, perhaps against his better judgement. Sokka put his hand on the doorknob and prepared to leave. Instinctively, Zuko leaned forward and grabbed his wrist.

“What are you doing?” he said. 

He liked the feel of Sokka’s wrist in his hand. He liked the way his cologne smelled faintly of orange blossoms, and how it permeated the tiny laundry room. Zuko leaned in and he kissed him.

And Sokka kissed back. They stood there, flush against each other until Sokka pulled away, his thumb grazing Zuko’s lower lip. “We can’t stay here.”

“Wait-” But Sokka had already left. And suddenly Zuko couldn’t think straight.

It was like he was moving in slow motion, up the stairs, into the bedroom where his wife was kissing another man, and he couldn’t even blame her for it. In fact, the look in her eyes when she saw him standing in the doorway was enough to get him pushing through the crowd and out of the house. Straight into Toph. 

“Take me home,” he breathed, and she furrowed her brow. 

“Shouldn’t you be going home with your wife?”

“I don’t think she’s my wife anymore.”

“Probably for the best,” Toph said. “We’ll go to your place. You can drive.” 

The car ride was quiet, only the drone of the radio to fill the silence.

“Whatever is clearly on your mind,” Toph said, nudging him, “just say it.”

It was a risk, sure. But Toph had been hiding a lot longer than he had, and she was ruthlessly clever. “I think your secret’s much more common than either of us is pretending,” Zuko said. “I think maybe all of us have at least a little bit of that secret within us. I think I just might have that secret in me, too.” 

Zuko took a right and pulled into my driveway. He put the car in park.

“You’re not like me, Zuko.” 

“I might be,” Zuko said. “I might be, and Sokka might be, too.” 

Toph turned to the window, thinking. “Yes,” she said finally. “Sokka might be, too.” 

“You knew?” 

“I suspected,” she said. “And I suspected he might have feelings for you.”

Zuko felt like he was the last person on earth to know what was right in front of him. 

“Goodnight, Zuko.” Toph said, fondness in her voice. “You know what's going to happen, now that Ty Lee and you are through. They'll blackball you. I hope you know I'm on your side.” 

“Goodnight, Toph.” God, he loved her. 

He watched Toph’s car leave before he even turned to the house he and Ty Lee were supposed to share, its pristine exterior so inexplicably ugly. 

There, on his porch, was Sokka Naquier. 

The street was as quiet as you’d expect in Beverly Hills at just past three in the morning. He took Sokka’s hand and led him inside. “I’m not-” Sokka said when Zuko shut the door behind them. “I just-there was a guy in high school, my best friend. And he and I-” 

“I don’t want to hear about it,” Zuko said.

“OK,” Sokka replied. “I’m just, I’m not, there’s nothing wrong with me. I've loved women.” 

“I know there’s nothing wrong with you.” He looked at Zuko, looking to understand exactly what he wanted from him, exactly what he should confess. 

“Here is what I know,” Zuko said. “I know that I thought I could love Ty Lee.”

“I know you love Ty Lee,” Sokka replied defensively, arms crossed. 

“I said that I thought I could love her. But I don’t think I can.”

“Okay.”

“Now, the only person I think about is you.”

And suddenly Sokka was kissing him. 


	2. why am i still writing pages

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, please keep in mind that this is basically 7HOEH (that's a mouthful) but rephrased to fit zukka.  
> i'm like the dollar store version of taylor jenkins reed.  
> tw for mention of death & a car accident, though it's near the end.  
> i appreciate the kudos and comments!!!!! pls keep it up i love validation lmaooooo

_“You guys were together? Just like that?” Korra can’t hide her shock. Seriously, it must be harder than that. Especially in that era._

_Zuko is silent for a long moment, golden eyes harsh. Korra slowly comes to realize it’s him trying to comprehend her stupidity._

_“It wasn’t easy,” he says with a calm voice. “Nothing with Sokka ever was.”_

He and Sokka had been taking great pains not to be seen together. It was one thing when they really were just friends, but now that they had something to hide, they had to start hiding it.

“I love you,” Zuko said, as Sokka left for the Oscars. He wasn’t attending. Ty Lee’s management had made sure of it when they painted him as a cold-hearted workaholic in the press. It wasn’t a lie, but it still stung. “I believe in you. Break a leg.” 

When Sokka’s hand turned the doorknob, he called to Zuko. “If I don’t win,” he said, still-wet hair dripping onto his white undershirt, “will you still love me?”

He thought Sokka was joking until he looked directly into his eyes. “You could be a nobody living in a cardboard box, and I’d still love you,” he said. He had never said that before. Zuko had never meant it before. Sokka smiled wide. “Me too. The cardboard box and all of it.”

Hours later, at the home he used to share with Ty Lee but now could say was entirely his own, he made himself a Long Island iced tea, sat on the couch, and tuned the TV to NBC, watching all his colleagues and the man he loved walk the red carpet at the Pantages Theatre. It all seemed much more glamorous on-screen. In person, the theatre was smaller, the people pale. Everyone was human.

But from afar? They could have been gods. 

He was two iced teas in and drowning in self-pity by the time they announced Best Supporting Actor. But the minute the camera panned to Sokka, he sobered up.

“And the award goes to . . . Sokka Naquier for Camelot.” 

Zuko jumped up off the couch and shouted for him. As Sokka stood there, behind the microphone, holding the statuette, Zuko was mesmerized. By his stunning tuxedo, loose necklace (a risk, to be sure. People loved to talk), and that absolutely flawless face of his. 

“Thank you to Zhao and Toph Beifong. Thank you to my family. And to the amazing cast of actors that I felt so lucky to be a part of, to Jet and Suki. And to Zuko. Thank you.” 

When he said Zuko’s name, he swelled with pride and joy and love, like nothing he had ever felt before. He was so goddamn happy for Sokka. Not jealous, not spiteful. Just pure joy. And then he did something mortifyingly inane. He kissed the television set. He kissed him right on his grayscale face. The clink he heard registered before the pain. 

And as Sokka waved to the crowd and then stepped away from the podium, Zuko dimly realized he’d chipped his tooth. But he didn’t care. He was too happy. 

Too excited to congratulate him and tell Sokka how proud he was.

Later, when Sokka had snuck in, they lay across from each other in the bed Zuko used to share with Ty Lee.

“I don’t know if I was supposed to take this one,” Sokka said, smiling. The gold statuette was on the bedside table. It didn't have his name on it yet. “But I didn’t want to give it back.”

“Why aren’t you out celebrating? You should be at the Sunset party.” 

“I only wanted to celebrate with you.” Zuko pulled him closer. Sokka kicked off his shoes. 

“Nothing means anything without you,” he said. “Everything that isn’t you is nothing to me.” 

Zuko laughed. 

“What happened to your tooth?” Sokka asked, brow suddenly furrowed. 

“Is it that noticeable?” 

Sokka shrugged. “I guess not. I think it’s just that I’ve memorized every inch of you.”

“It’s embarrassing.”

Now Sokka was intrigued. Zuko sighed. “I kissed the television screen. When you won. I kissed your face.” 

Sokka laughed so hard that tears formed in his beautiful blue eyes. And then he rolled over on top of Zuko and put his arms around Zuko’s neck. “That’s the most lovable thing anyone has ever done since the dawn of man.”

Both of Zuko’s next movies flopped. A romance Sokka did sold out theaters. Ty Lee starred in a hit war-time movie. And then he saw a foreign film, one about forbidden love. Zuko left the theater, went straight home, called Toph Beifong, and said, “I have an idea. I’m going to Paris.”

He decided it was the perfect time to go to France. Toph had some connections to filmmakers in Paris. She made a few calls on the sly. 

Some of the producers and directors he met with knew who he was. Some of them were clearly seeing him just as a favor to Toph. And then there was Yue, an up-and-coming New Wave director, who had never heard of him before. 

“You are beautiful,” she said. They were sitting in a quiet bar in one of the neighbourhoods of Paris, huddled in a booth in the back. It was just after dinnertime, and Zuko hadn’t had a chance to eat. Yue was drinking a white Bordeaux. He had a glass of claret. 

“That sounds like a compliment,” he said, taking a sip. 

“I don’t know if I have before met a man so stunning,” she said, staring at him. Her accent was so thick that Zuko found himself leaning in to hear her.

“Thank you.” 

“You can act?” she said. 

“Better than I look.” 

“That cannot be so.” 

“It is.” He saw Yue’s wheels start turning. “Are you willing to test for a part?

Zuko was willing to jump in front of a train for a part. But Yue didn’t have to know that. “If the part is great,” he said. 

Yue smiled. “This part is spectacular. This part is a movie-star part.” 

He nodded slowly. “Send me the pages, and we’ll talk,” he said, and then he drank the last of his wine and stood up. “I’m so sorry, Yue, but I should go. Have a wonderful evening. Let’s be in touch.” 

There was absolutely no way he was going to sit at a bar with a woman who hadn’t heard of him and let her think he had all the time in the world. He could feel her eyes on him as he walked away, but he walked out the door with all the confidence he had—which, despite his current predicament, was quite a lot. 

And then he went back to his hotel room, put on his pajamas, ordered room service, and turned on the TV. Before he went to bed, he wrote Sokka a letter.

_Sokka,_

_I love you more than words will ever express. Remember that I may rise with the sun, but it rises and sets with your smile. I miss you terribly._

_Z._

He folded it in half and tucked it into an envelope addressed to Sokka. Then he turned out my light and closed his eyes. Three hours later, he was awakened by the jarring sound of a phone ringing on the table. He picked it up, irritated and half asleep. “Bonjour?” he said. 

“We can speak your language, Zuko.” Yue’s accented English reverberated through the phone. “I am calling to see if you would be free to be in a movie I am shooting. The week after next.” 

“Two weeks from now?”

“Yes. We are shooting six hours from Paris. You will do it? I have another actor, but I will fire him if you do it.” 

“What’s the movie?”

“Remake of Pride and Prejudice. You will be Darcy, an American.”

“Let me sleep on it,” Zuko said. He knew he was going to take the part. It was the only part he could get.

“Yes,” Yue said. “Of course. You have shot shirtless before, yes?” 

“Yes,” Zuko said and it wasn’t totally a lie. He had been briefly shirtless for Camelot. It wasn't an unusual request.

“I think you should be exposed. In the film.” If he was going to be asked to show the scars that lined his chest, wouldn’t it be for a French film? And if the French were going to ask anyone, shouldn’t it be him? He knew what got him famous the first time. He knew what it could do a second time. Apparently people liked the flawed, the almost human. 

“Why don’t we discuss it tomorrow?” Zuko said.

They finished shooting less than a month later. The scene that would become the most famous was the scene where he stepped out of the lake. There was so much anticipation. And it never paid off, no matter how many times you watched it, no matter how perfectly you paused the tape, you never really saw him. And here’s why it worked: man, woman, gay, straight, bisexual, you name it, they all just want to be teased. 

Six months after they finished shooting _Pride and Prejudice_ , he was an international sensation.

In retrospect, his relationship with Sokka came crashing down when they went to Suki Chen’s party. And it was completely his own fault. 

The band Suki had hired ended their first song, and everyone started clapping and cheering. Toph leaned over Zuko as she clapped so Sokka could hear her. “You know, you won an Oscar, Sokka,” she said. “You can do whatever the hell you want.” 

He threw his head back and laughed as he clapped. “Well, then I want to go get a steak.” 

“Steak it is,” Zuko said. He didn’t know whether it was the laughing or the cheering or the clapping. There was so much noise around him, so much chaos from the crowd. 

But for one fleeting moment, he forgot himself. He forgot where he was. He forgot who he was. He forgot who he was with. And he grabbed Sokka’s hand and held it. He looked down, surprised. Toph must have noticed the shift, because her expression turned serious. 

He pulled his hand away, and just as he corrected himself, he saw a woman across the room from them staring. She looked to be in her mid thirties, with perfectly applied crimson lipstick. Her lips turned down as she looked at him. She had seen. She had seen him hold Sokka's hand. And she had seen him pull it back. She knew both what he had done and that he had not meant for her to have seen it. Her eyes narrowed. 

And any hope Zuko had that she did not realize who he was went right out the window when she turned to the man next to her, probably her husband, and whispered in his ear. Zuko watched as his gaze moved from the band to him.

Later, when they had gone home, Sokka turned to him, something unreadable in his blue eyes. “This isn’t a life, Zuko.” 

“It’s our life.” He said. “We’ve sacrificed so much, we can’t give up now.”

“Yes, I can,” Sokka said. “I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to live this way. I don’t want to drive an awful brown car to your home so no one knows I’m here. I don’t want to pretend I live by myself in Hollywood when I live here with you in this house. And I don’t want to be meant for someone like you.”

“Like me?”

“You’re a coward,” Sokka said. “I can’t believe I ever felt differently.”

The fight didn’t make sense, its provocation didn’t make sense. But there was nothing Zuko could do to stop it.

He opened the door to leave, not even looking back. Zuko watched him walk out to the front stoop, down the stairs, and over to his car. He followed him out and stood, frozen, in the driveway. He threw his bag into the passenger’s side of his car. And then he opened the door on the driver’s side and stood there.

“I’ll lose everything if people find out what we are,” Zuko said. There was nothing else to say, not really.

“What we are,” Sokka said, eyes hard. “Don’t go around trying to pretend we’re the same.” 

“We are,” Zuko said. “And you know that I am.” 

“Bullshit. I can love a woman, Zuko. I can go marry any woman I want and have children and be happy. And we both know that wouldn’t come easily for you.”

The searing pain in Zuko’s chest felt like water boiling. “You know what? You’re right. You aren’t meant for someone like me,” he said finally. “Because I’m willing to do what it takes to make a world for us, and you’re won’t. You won’t make the hard decisions; you aren’t willing to do the ugly stuff. And I’ve always known that. But I thought you’d at least have the decency to admit you need someone like me. You need someone who will get his hands dirty to protect you. You want to play like you’re all high and mighty all the time. Well, try doing that without someone in the trenches protecting you.” Sokka’s face was stoic, frozen. Zuko wasn’t sure he’d heard a single word he’d said. “I never had a back-up plan, Sokka. But you clearly have one. I'm glad you've thought so heavily about a life without me in it.”

“I guess we aren’t as right for each other as we thought,” Sokka said, and then he got into his car. It wasn’t until that moment, with his hand on the steering wheel, that Zuko realized this was really happening, that this wasn’t just a fight they were having. That this was the fight that would end them. It had all been going so well and had turned so quickly in the other direction, like a leaf in a windstorm.

“I guess not,” was all he could say. It came out weak, choked. So terribly transparent. Sokka started the car and put it in reverse. “Good-bye, Zuko,” he said at the very last minute. Then he backed out of the driveway and disappeared down the road.

_“Is that how it ended?” Korra asks, her mind racing._

_Zuko shakes his head. “We didn’t speak for years after that. Five years. He never called, I never wrote. I couldn’t bring myself to try to win him back.”_

_“Do you regret all those years not speaking?”_

_Zuko looks at her like she’s stupid. “He was the love of my life, Korra. And he’s gone now. He’s gone. There’s no calling and telling him I’m sorry and asking him to come back. I wish I had. I wish I had sent him thousands of roses and told him I loved him and fought for us. But Sokka was right, I was a coward. And I couldn’t do it.” His gold eyes shine with unshed tears. “I should have chased him down the street the day he left me. I should have stood on top of the Hollywood sign and shouted, ‘I’m in love with Sokka Naquier!’ and let them crucify me for it. That’s what I should have done. And now that I don’t have him, and I have more money than I could ever use in this lifetime, and my name is cemented in Hollywood history, and I know how hollow it is, I am kicking myself for every single second I chose it over loving him proudly. But that’s a luxury. You can do that when you’re rich and famous. You can decide that wealth and renown are worthless when you have them. Back then, I still thought I had all the time I needed to do everything I wanted. That if I just played my cards right, I could have it all. I could still have him.”_

_“You thought he’d come back to you?”_

_“I knew he’d come back to me. We both knew our time wasn’t over.”_

_“How did he come back?”_

_“He came back when I married Toph.”_

“No one is going to believe it,” Toph said as Zuko drove her to the tennis club. “People in town, at least.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“You and me. There are a lot of people who will dismiss it right out of hand.” 

“Because..?” 

“Because they know what I am. I mean, I’ve considered doing something like this before, maybe one day even marrying some guy. God knows it would make my mother happy. She’s still sitting there, in Champaign, Illinois, desperately wondering when I’ll find a nice man and have a family. I would love to have a family. But too many people would see through it.” She looked at Zuko briefly as he drove. “And I know people will see through this.” 

“So we make it undeniable,” Zuko said. 

The thing he liked about Toph was that she was never one step behind him. “Photos,” she said. “Of the two of us.” 

“Yeah. Candids, looking like we’ve been caught at something.” 

“Isn’t it easier for you just to pick someone else?” she said.

“I don’t want to get to know someone else,” Zuko said. “I’m sick of trying to pretend I’m happy. At least with you, I’ll be pretending to love someone I really do love.” 

Toph was quiet for a moment. “I think you should know something,” she said finally. “I’ve been seeing Suki Chen.”

Zuko felt his heart leap. “Sokka’s Suki Chen?” He’d heard of their quick engagement, their luxurious wedding. The press ate it up. Lancelot and Guinevere. Star-crossed lovers. 

Toph nodded.

“For how long?”

“A few weeks.”

Zuko paused, considered his phrasing. “So the marriage is….?”

“Fake, yeah. Apparently, it was real when they started, but they both thought they’d be better as friends. They even sleep in separate beds.”

“Have you seen him?” Zuko’s voice was barely above a whisper. That was all he could manage. 

“Yes,” Toph replied, eyes sad. 

“Has he asked about me?”

“No. But it’s not because he doesn’t care. I think he doesn’t want to know.”

“But he doesn’t love her?”

“No, he doesn’t love her.”

Zuko turned his head back to the road. He imagined telling Toph they were going to Sokka’s house. He imagined running to his door. He imagined dropping to his knees and telling him the truth, that life without him was lonely and empty and quickly losing all meaning. 

Instead, he said, “When should we do the picture?” 

“What?” 

“The picture of you and me. Where we make it look like we’ve been caught in an affair.” 

“We can do it tomorrow night,” Toph said. “We can park the car. Maybe up in the hills, so photogs can find us but the picture will look secluded. I’ll call Jin. She needs some money.”

Zuko shook his head. “It can’t come from us. We need someone else to call it in. Someone the rags will believe wants me to get caught.” 

“Who?”

He called Jet Li. Who was more than eager.

“You’re not really famous if anybody still likes you,” Jet said. “I’ll call tomorrow. Good luck with whatever it is you’re doing.” 

“Thanks,” Zuko said. “You’re a lifesaver.” 

It went almost too perfectly. The image printed in the papers the next week was tawdry, scandalous, and shocking. It showed he and Toph with swollen faces and looks of guilt, her hand on his face, tracing his cheekbone.

_“Wow.” Korra says. “You’re brilliant.”_

_Zuko smirks. It makes him look young. “One of my better ideas, to be sure.”_

_Korra has no idea that in a few hours, Zuko will finish his story, and she’ll find out what this has all been about, and she will hate him so much that she’ll be truly afraid she might kill him._

He was nominated for Best Actor that year. The only problem was that Sokka was nominated too. Zuko showed up on the red carpet with Toph. They were engaged. He’d given her a diamond and emerald ring. It stood out against the matching black satin formalwear they had on. Something so beautiful, you couldn’t help but stare.

Speaking of, Sokka had arrived early, in a royal blue tuxedo that complimented his eyes and made him look almost ethereal. When Zuko saw him for the first time in almost five years, it all came rushing back. And he could barely breathe.

Suki was on his arm, in a dress that looked as though it was made from ocean waves. Even if it was all a sham, they made a beautiful couple. Like the Gods had made them to be together.

“Zuko,” Toph said, shaking his arm. “I know you’re staring.”

“Sorry,” he said. “Thank you.” They took their seats. 

When they called out the nominees for Best Actor, he scanned the audience for Sokka. Zuko spotted Sokka the very same moment Sokka spotted Zuko. They locked eyes. And then the presenter didn’t say “Zuko” or “Sokka.” He said “Jet.” 

When Zuko’s heart sank into his chest, aching and heavy, he was mad at himself for believing he had a chance. And then he wondered if Sokka was OK.

Toph squeezed his hand. He hoped Suki was squeezing Sokka’s. 

He excused himself to the bathroom.

He was alone. He sat in a stall and closed the door. He let himself cry. 

“Zuko?” 

He didn’t spend years pining away for one voice not to notice it when it finally appeared. 

“Sokka?” He said. His back was to the stall door. He wiped his eyes. 

“I saw you come in here,” Sokka said. “I thought it might be a sign that you weren’t-that you were upset.” 

“I’m trying to be happy for Jet,” Zuko said, laughing just a little bit as he used a piece of toilet paper to carefully dry his eyes. “But it’s not exactly my style.”

“Mine either,” Sokka said.

Zuko opened the door. And there he was. Blue tux, dark hair, the kind of eyes that were so blue that they hardly looked real. And when those eyes set on him, he knew Sokka still loved him. 

He could see it in the way his eyes widened and softened. “You are as handsome as ever,” he said as he leaned against the sink, his arms holding his weight behind him. 

There was always something intoxicating about the way Sokka looked at him. Like he was the only person that mattered. “You’re not so bad yourself,” Zuko said. 

“We probably shouldn’t be caught in here together,” Sokka said. 

“Why not?” He asked. 

“Because I suspect more than a few people seated in there know what we once got up to,” Sokka said. “I know you’d hate for them to think we were up to it again.”

This was a test. They both knew it. 

“Or maybe you just don’t want to be seen with someone like me.”

Sokka laughed and looked down at the floor and then back up at Zuko. “What do you want me to say? That I was wrong? I was. I wanted to hurt you like you hurt me.”

“But I never meant to hurt you,” Zuko said. “Never once would I have done a single thing to hurt you on purpose.”

"You were ashamed to love me.” 

“Absolutely not,” Zuko said. “That is absolutely untrue.” 

“Well, you certainly went to great lengths to hide it.”

“I did what had to be done to protect both of us.”

“Debatable.” 

“So debate it with me,” Zuko said. “Instead of running away again.”

“I didn’t run far,” Sokka’s expression was sad. “You could have come after me.”

“I don’t like being played, Sokka. I told you that the first time we went out for milkshakes.” 

He shrugged. “You play everyone else.”

_Not you,_ Zuko’s mind supplied. “I have never claimed that I wasn’t a hypocrite.” 

“How do you do that?” Sokka said. 

“Do what?”

“Act so cavalier about things that are sacred to other people?” 

“Because other people have got nothing to do with me.” Sokka scoffed, somewhat gently, and looked down at his hands. “Except you,” Zuko said, rewarded with the sight of Sokka looking up. “I care about you,” Zuko said. 

“You cared about me.” 

He shook his head. “No, I didn’t misspeak. I may have slept with other people, but the person I care about is you.” 

“Women?” Sokka asked, clearly hoping the answer was yes. If it was women, it wouldn’t mean anything. 

Zuko shook his head, and his heart broke just a little bit more from the look on Sokka’s face. 

“Anyone I know?” 

“None of them were famous,” He said. “None of them meant anything to me. I touched them and thought of what it felt like to touch you. You shouldn’t have left me, Sokka.” 

Sokka’s voice was almost too quiet, so unlike him. “You shouldn’t have let me leave.”

“I know.” And then they were kissing. They could have been caught at any moment. If one man in the whole auditorium chose to visit the mens’ room during those seven minutes, they’d have lost everything they’d worked so hard for. 

That's how Zuko and Sokka forgave each other. And how they knew they couldn’t live without each other. Because now they both knew what they were willing to risk. Just to be together.

_“The tabloids called us “Hollywood’s Favourite Double-Daters.” I even heard rumours that the four of us were swingers, which wasn’t that crazy for that period of time. It really makes you think, doesn’t it? That people were so eager to believe we were swapping spouses but would have been scandalized to know we were monogamous and queer?”_

_Korra can’t help but laugh. Zuko smiles at her amusement._

_“Um,” she says, before she can think better of it. “Did you ever meet a guy named Aang? He worked at the movie lots when you were there?”_

_Zuko’s mood changes suddenly, and his eyes flash with something dangerous. “For a while, everything was amazing. I married Toph, he was married to Suki, and we all loved each other.”_

_Korra tries to push away the uneasy feeling she gets when Zuko ignores her question._

In 1974, on his thirty sixth birthday, Toph, Sokka, Suki, and Zuko all went out to the Palace. It was supposedly the most expensive restaurant in the world during that time. Completely absurd, looking back on it. 

Sokka lightly tapped his fork against his glass. “Okay,” he said. “Small speech time.” He was due to shoot a film in Montana the following week. He’d postponed the start date so he could be with Zuko that night. 

“To Zuko,” he said, lifting his glass in the air. “Who has lit up every goddamn room he ever walked into. And who, day after day, makes us feel like we’re living in a dream.”

But, as dramatic as it sounds, dreams end. And theirs would end soon. 

These are simply things you do. These are kindnesses you extend to the person you love when you know that your job will entail the world seeing images of you having sex with another person. They knew his next film, starring opposite Ty Lee, was going to be explicit. But Sokka hadn’t known just how much. 

He did none of that for Sokka. Instead, he sat at the foot of their bed, pretending to ask for permission for something that had already happened. “I just… I wanted to let you know that Ty Lee and I have discussed it, and I think the love scene in the movie will be more graphic than you and I were thinking.” 

“How graphic?”

“It’s not real, you know I’ll never feel anything with her.” Zuko said, avoiding the question. 

“I know, but what you’re saying to me is that you are prepared to make it look real. You’re saying you’re going to make it look more real than anything else any of us have done so far.” 

“Yes,” Zuko said. “I guess I am saying that.” 

Sokka put his head in his hands. “I feel like I’m failing you,” he said. “But I can’t do it. I can’t. I know myself, and I know this is too much for me. I’ll be too sick over it. I’ll make myself ill thinking of you with her.” He shook his head, resolved. “I’m sorry. I don’t have it in me. I can’t handle it. I want to be stronger for you, I do. I know that if the tables were turned, you could handle it. I feel like I’m disappointing you. And I’m so sorry, Zuko. I will work forever to make it up to you. I’ll help you get any part you want. For the rest of our lives. And I’ll work on getting there so that the next time this happens, I can be stronger. But please, Zuko, I can’t live through you sleeping with her. Even if it only looks real. I can’t do it. Please,” he said. “Please don’t do this.” 

Zuko’s heart sank. He looked down at the floor. He studied the way two planks of wood met just under his feet, how the nailheads were just the littlest bit sunken in. And then he looked up at the person he loved more than anyone else in the world and said, “I already did it.”

So, for the second time, Sokka said, “I can’t do this anymore.” And he walked out the door and left. Within a week, he had packed up all his things, at Zuko’s apartment and his, and moved back to L.A. He would not answer the phone when Zuko called. He couldn’t get hold of him. 

Then, weeks after he left, he filed for divorce from Suki. When she got the papers, it was as if he had served them to Zuko directly. It was clear, in no uncertain terms, that by divorcing her, Sokka was divorcing him.

That’s how final it felt. He had pushed Sokka too far. And it was over.

_“That was it? It was all over?”_

_“He was done with me,” Zuko says._

_“What about the movie?”_

_“Are you asking if it was worth it?”_

_“I guess so.”_

_“The movie was a huge hit. Didn’t make it worth it.”_

_“Ty Lee won an Oscar for it, didn’t she?”_

_Zuko rolls his eyes. “She won an Oscar, and I wasn’t even nominated. Because she was the beautiful ingenue, and I was the man who corrupted her.”_

_“You won an Oscar shortly after that.”_

_“I lost Sokka for that movie,” he says. “My life, which I loved so much, was turned upside down over that movie. Of course, I understand it was my own fault. I’m the one who filmed an explicit sex scene with my ex-wife without talking to him about it first. I’m not trying to blame other people for the mistakes I made in my own relationship. But still.” He’s quiet for a moment. “Korra, I want you to make something clear in this book. I’m not a good person.”_

_I don’t know,” Korra says. “You don’t seem so bad, Zuko.”_

_“You, of all people, are going to change your mind about that,” he says. “Very soon.”_

_And all Korra can think is, What the fuck did he do?_

Suki died of a heart attack in 1980. She was just shy of fifty. It didn’t make any sense. The most athletic and fit of them, the one who didn’t smoke, the one who exercised every day, she shouldn’t have been the one whose heart stopped. But things don’t make sense. And when she left, she left a giant-sized hole in their lives.

Toph was inconsolable. For weeks, She could barely get out of bed. When she did, it was to drink bourbon. She was rarely sober, always sombre, and often unkind.

Sokka was photographed in tears, his eyes bloodshot, walking into his trailer on location in Arizona. Zuko wanted to hold him. He wanted them to see one another through it. But that wasn’t in the cards. Still, he could help Toph. He stayed with her at her apartment every day. She slept in her room there. Zuko slept on the sofa. He made sure she ate. He made sure she bathed.

At the funeral, Toph wore a black vintage Halston. Zuko wore a black suit with a black shirt, black tie, black belt, and black socks. Grief never left Toph's face. Her profound, guttural pain didn’t follow the story they had sold the press, that Toph and Suki were friends, that Zuko and Toph were in love. Nor did the fact that Suki left the house to Toph. But despite his instincts, Zuko did not encourage Toph to hide her feelings or decline the house. He had very little energy left to try to hide who they were. He had learned all too well that pain was sometimes stronger than the need to keep up appearances. 

Sokka attended the funeral, eyes downcast. He never looked Zuko’s way. Zuko never made any attempt to approach him. He couldn’t use Toph’s loss to manage his own.

It was then, in the middle of that horrible funeral, that he knew his life had truly disintegrated. That everything he had built had fallen apart. The family he had worked so hard for was well and truly over.

Zuko knew the only way to get Toph to start living her life again was to get her something she loved. So work was his only option. He had to find something she would love. It had to be a script she would feel passionate about and one with a great role for him. Not because he wanted a great role but because Toph wouldn’t do anything for herself. But she would do anything if she believed he needed her to.

So he read scripts. Hundreds of scripts over the months. And then Yue sent him one that she was having trouble getting made: _C’est La Vie._ It was a movie about a war veteran suffering from PTSD, and the tragic love story between him and his best friend since childhood.

“I think this is what’s going to get me an Oscar,” Zuko said. And that’s what got Toph to read it.

He loved shooting for _C’est La Vie_ . And it wasn’t because he finally got that goddamn statue for it or because he became even closer with Yue on the set. He loved shooting _C’est La Vie_ because while it didn’t get Toph to put down the bottle, it did get her out of bed.

Toph squeezed his hand as the announcer opened the envelope for Best Actor. 

And then, despite everything Zuko had told himself, the announcer said his name. Zuko stared straight ahead, his chest heaving, unable to process what he’d heard. And then Toph grinned and said, “You did it.” He stood up and hugged her. He walked to the podium, He took the Oscar and put his hand to his chest to try to slow down his heartbeat. When the clapping subsided, He leaned in to the microphone and gave a speech that was both premeditated and totally unplanned. He tried to remember what he’d prepared to say all the other times he thought he might win. “Thank you,” Zuko said, looking out into a sea of familiar, gorgeous faces. “Thank you not just for this award, which I will cherish forever, but also for letting me work in this business. It hasn’t always been easy, and God knows I’ve made a bumpy road of it, but I feel so incredibly lucky to live this life. So thank you not just to every producer I’ve worked with since the mid-fifties—oh, God, I’m really dating myself here—but specifically to my favorite producer, Toph Beifong. I love you.”

He didn’t have to look at Toph to know she was smiling. “And to all the other actors and actresses I’ve worked with, to all the directors who have helped me grow as a performer, especially Yue, I thank you.” He took a deep breath, saying his next words before he could think better of it. “And there’s one other person out there, who I think about every day. I know he’s watching this, and I just want him to know how much he means to me. Thank you.”

Ten years before, he would have been far too scared to say anything. He probably would have been too scared even to think about saying something like that. But he had to tell him. Even though they hadn’t spoken in years. He had to show Sokka that he still loved him. That he always would.

“ _I married Yue,” Zuko says. “Because she loved me in a way no one had since Sokka. Even if I didn’t love her the same way. It was selfish, but I was so tired of being lonely. I thought I could force myself into loving someone whose love for me was so unconditional.”_

_“But you couldn’t?”_

_“I couldn’t.” He says. His golden eyes hold an emotion Korra doesn’t quite understand._

In 1988, Sokka played the role of Prior Walter in a film adaptation of _Angels in America_. He could have submitted himself for Best Actor. There was no other man with a bigger part in the movie than him. But he must have submitted himself for Best Supporting, because when the ballot came out, that was what he was nominated for. The moment Zuko saw it, he knew it had been his call. Sokka was just that smart. Naturally, he voted for him. When Sokka won, he was in New York with Toph. Yue had gone to the awards that year alone. It was a fight between the two of them. She wanted him with her, but he wanted to spend the evening with Toph, not in a theatre full of people who hated him.

He and Toph watched the awards ceremony from the comfort of her apartment. Sokka was wearing an all black tuxedo. His dark hair, now shorter, was messy in just the right way. He was older, certainly, but never more breathtaking. When they called his name, he got up on the stage and accepted his award with the grace and sincerity that audiences had always known him for. And just as he was about to leave the microphone, he said, “And to anyone tempted to kiss the TV tonight, please don’t chip your tooth.”

Toph grinned and punched him in the arm. “You should call him,” she said. “It’s never a bad idea to bury the hatchet.”

Instead, he wrote a letter.

_Dearest Sokka,_

_I did not kiss the screen when you won tonight, however tempted I was._

_Old habits truly do die hard. I watched the film, and you were a marvel._

_You are the actor of our generation, that I’m sure of._

_I wish for nothing more than your happiness._

_All my love,_

_Zuko_

He didn’t expect a response. But a week later, in a small cream coloured envelope, he got one.

_Zuko,_

_Reading your letter felt like gasping for air after being trapped underwater._

_Forgive me for being so blunt, but how did we make such a mess of it all? A_

_nd what does it mean that we have not spoken in a decade but I still hear your voice in my head every day?_

_XO_

_Sokka_

_Sokka,_

_I own all of our missteps. I was selfish and shortsighted._

_I can only hope that you have found bliss somewhere else. You deserve so much happiness._

_And I am sorry I could not give that to you. I wish I could have._

_Love, Zuko_

_My Dearest Zuko,_

_You are dealing in revisionist history. I was insecure and petty and naive. I blamed you for the things you did to keep our secrets._

_But the truth is, each time you stopped the outside world from coming into our life, I felt immense relief._

_And all my happiest moments were orchestrated by you. I never gave you enough credit for that. We were both to blame._

_But you were the only one to ever apologize. Please let me rectify that now: I’m sorry, Zuko._

_Love, Sokka_

_P.S. I watched Yue’s film some months ago. It is a bold, brave, important film. I would have been wrong to stand in the way of it._

_Y_ _ou have always been so much more talented than I ever gave you credit for._

  
  


_My Dearest Sokka,_

_Do you think lovers can ever be friends? I hate to think of the years we have left in this life wasted by continuing not to speak._

_I hate to think of never speaking with you again. I’m desperate to see you._

_Love, Zuko_

_My Dearest Zuko,_

_To be frank, the news that you and Yue married breaks me. I do not know if I could bear seeing you given those circumstances._

_Love, Sokka_

_My Dearest Sokka,_

_I have called you many times in the past week, but you have not returned my calls. I’ll try again. Please, Sokka. Please._

_Love, Zuko_

“Hello?” Sokka’s voice sounded exactly like it always had, unashamed yet somehow soft. 

“It’s me.” Zuko said.

“Hi.” The way he warmed up in that moment made Zuko hopeful that he might be able to put his life back together, the way it should have always been. 

“You know I can’t love Yue,” Zuko said. 

The line was quiet. Then Sokka asked, “What are you saying?” 

“I’m saying I’d like to see you.” 

“I can’t see you, Zuko.” 

“Yes, you can.” 

“What do you want us to do?” he said. “Ruin each other all over again?” 

“Do you still love me?” Zuko asked. Sokka was silent. 

“I still love you, Sokka. I swear I do.”

“I don’t think we should talk about this. Not if...” 

“Not if what?” 

“Nothing has changed, Zuko.” 

“Everything has changed.” 

“People still can’t know who we really are.” 

“Elton John is out of the closet,” Zuko said. “Has been for years.” 

“Elton John doesn’t have a career based on audiences believing he’s a straight man.” 

“You’re saying we’ll lose our jobs?”

“I can’t believe I have to tell you this,” he said. 

“Well, let me tell you something that has changed,” Zuko told him. “I no longer care. I’m ready to give it all up.” 

“You can’t be serious.” 

“I’m absolutely serious.” 

“Zuko, we haven’t even seen each other in years.”

“I know you were able to forget me,” he said. “I’m sure you were with other people.” Zuko waited, hoping Sokka would correct him, hoping he would tell him there had been no one else. But he didn’t. And so Zuko continued. “But can you honestly say that you stopped loving me?” 

“Of course not.” “

And I can’t say that, either. I have loved you every single day.” 

“You married someone else.” 

“I married her because she helped me forget you,” Zuko said. “Not because I stopped loving you.” 

He heard Sokka breathe deeply. “I’ll come to L.A.,” Zuko said. “And you and I will have dinner. OK?”

“Dinner?” he said. 

“Just dinner. We have things to talk about. I think we at least owe each other a nice, long talk. How about the week after next? I can stay for a few days.” Sokka was quiet again. Zuko could tell he was thinking. He got the impression that this was a deciding moment for his future, their future. 

“OK,” Sokka said. “Dinner.”

The morning he left for the airport, Yue slept in late. She was supposed to be on set later in the afternoon for a night shoot, so he squeezed her hand good-bye and then grabbed his things from the closet. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to take Sokka’s letters with him or not. He had kept them all, with their envelopes, in a box at the back of his closet. Over the past few days, as Zuko was gathering what he would take, he packed them and then unpacked them, trying to decide. He had been rereading them every day since he and Sokka started talking. He didn’t want to be apart from them.They were grounding, something real in a life full of pretend. He liked to run his fingers over the words, feeling the way the pen had embossed the paper. He liked hearing Sokka’s voice in his head. But he was flying to see Sokka. So he decided he didn’t need them. He put on his boots and grabbed his jacket, then unzipped his bag and pulled the letters out. He hid them behind his suits. 

He went down to the sidewalk to find his limo waiting. He gave the driver his bag, and at the very last minute, it occurred to Zuko that after his dinner with Sokka, he might tell him he didn’t want to see Zuko again. If that was to be the case, Zuko needed those letters. 

He made his way back upstairs and walked into the bedroom. And there, in his closet, was Yue. Sokka’s letters, which he had taken such care to keep in pristine condition, were flung about the room, most of them torn from the envelopes as if they were nothing more than junk mail.

“What are you doing?” Zuko said. 

Yue was in a long blue nightgown. “What am I doing?” she said. “That is too much. You coming in here asking me what I am doing.” 

“Those are mine.”

“I see that.”

“You are having an affair?” she said, a sad smile on her perfect face. “How very French of you.” 

“Yue, stop it.”

“I do not mind some infidelity, my dear. If it is respectfully done. And one does not leave evidence. But you’re gay, Zuko.”

He was a good actor. If he wanted to, he could convince Yue she was wrong. Convince her that they were nothing more than affectionate friends. But he didn’t have the energy. “Yes.” He said.

Yue nodded. “When you come back from LA, I will be gone.”

Zuko never wanted to keep a list of people he hurt with his actions, people he destroyed without consequence, but if he had, Yue would have been at the top of that list. 

When he got to the restaurant in LA, Sokka was already seated. He was wearing black slacks and an oversized cream-colored sweater. The temperature outside was warm, but the restaurant’s air-conditioning was on high, and he looked just a little bit cold. His dark hair had slivers of silver in it. His blue eyes were always more stunning in person. No photo could ever do them justice. The skin around them was softer now.

Sokka stood when he saw Zuko. “Zuko,” he said.

“Sokka.” 

“You look great,” he said. “You always do.” 

“You look just like you did the last time I saw you,” Zuko said. 

“We never did tell each other lies,” Sokka said, smiling. “Let’s not start now.” 

You’re beautiful,” Zuko said.

“Ditto.” Zuko ordered a glass of white wine. Sokka ordered a club soda with lime.

“I don’t drink anymore,” Sokka said. “It’s not sitting with me the way it once did.”

“That’s fine. If you want, I can toss my wine right out the window the moment it gets to the table.” 

“No,” he said, laughing. “Why should my low tolerance be your problem?” 

“I want everything about you to be my problem,” Zuko said. Sokka’s blue eyes went wide.

“Do you realize what you’re saying?”

“Of course I realize what I’m saying.” 

“You destroyed me,” he said. “Twice now in our lives. I have spent years getting over you.” 

“Did you succeed? Either time?” 

“Not completely.” 

“I think that means something.” 

“Why now?” he asked. “Why didn’t you call years ago?” 

“I called you a million times after you left me. I practically knocked down your door,” Zuko reminded him. “I thought you hated me.” 

“I did,” Sokka said. He pulled back a bit. “I still hate you, I think. At least a little bit.” 

“You think I don’t hate you, too?” Zuko tried to keep his voice down, tried to pretend it was a chat between two old friends. “Just a little bit?” 

Sokka grinned. “No, I suppose it would make sense that you do.” 

“But I’m not going to let that stop me,” Zuko said.

“What about Yue?”

“I’m filing for divorce. It’s been a long time coming. There’s nothing else, Sokka. There are no more mountains to climb. I spent my life hiding so no one would knock me off the mountain. Well, you know what? I’m done hiding. Let them come and get me. They can throw me down a well as far as I’m concerned. I’m signed on to do one last movie over at Fox later this year, and then I’m done.” 

“You don’t mean that.” 

“I do.”

Neither one of them spoke for a long moment. 

“I have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease,” Sokka said finally, breaking the silence. “I probably won’t make it much past sixty.”

Zuko stared. “You’re lying,” he said.

“I’m not.” 

“Yes, you are. That can’t be true.” 

“It is true.”

“No, it’s not,” Zuko said.

“It is,” Sokka said. He sipped the water in front of him. Zuko’s mind was reeling, heart pounding in his chest. And then Sokka spoke again, and the only reason Zuko was able to focus on his words was that he knew they were important. He knew they mattered. 

“I think you should do that last movie,” He said. “Finish strong. And then, after that, I think we should move to the coast of Spain.”

“What?” 

“I have always liked the idea of spending the last years of my life on a beautiful beach. With the love of a good man,” he said.

“You’re dying?”

“I can look into some locations in Spain while you’re shooting. I’ll sell my home here. I’ll get a compound somewhere, with enough space for Toph, too. And Katara.” 

“Your sister Katara?” Sokka nodded.

“She moved out here for business a few years ago. We’ve become close. She knows who I am. She supports me.”

“Can you handle this?” Sokka said, as he drove them to his apartment. 

“What do you mean?” Zuko asked him. “Of course I can’t handle it.” 

“If you can handle this, me living ten more years, max,” he said, “then we can do this. We can be together. I think we can spend the rest of our lives together, Zuko. If you can handle this. But I can’t, in good conscience, do this to you if you don’t think you’ll survive it.”

“Survive what, exactly?” 

“Losing me again. I don’t want to let you love me if you don’t think you can lose me again. One last time.” 

“I can’t. Of course I can’t. But I want to anyway. I’m going to anyway. Yes,” Zuko said finally. “I can survive it. I’d rather survive it than never feel it.”

“Are you sure?” He said.

“Yes,” Zuko said. “Yes, I’m sure. I’ve never been more sure about anything. I love you, Sokka. I’ve always loved you. And we should spend the rest of the time we have together.”

“Now what?” Zuko asked. Sokka had always been the plan guy. 

“Down the line, you marry my sister.” 

“Why am I going to marry Katara?” 

“So that when I die, everything I own will be yours. My estate will be under your control. And you can keep my legacy.”

“You could appoint that to me.” 

“And have someone try to take it away because you were my lover? No. This is better. This is smarter.” 

“But marrying your sister? Are you crazy?” 

“She’ll do it,” he said. “For me.”

Zuko thought about it. “It’s a good plan.”

“Yeah?” Sokka was flattered, he could tell.

“The student has become the master,” Zuko said. Sokka laughed, and he kissed him. “We’re home,” Zuko said. Not this apartment. They’d never lived here together before. But Sokka knew what he meant. 

“Yes,” he said. “We’re home.”

But Toph wasn’t on board. Not at first. She had a career, friends she didn’t want to leave behind. A life she didn’t want to uproot. It seemed final, stopped dead in its tracks. But then things changed.

“Listen, I have an idea,” She said. 

“About what?” 

“About Europe. I’m in love with someone, Zuko. I’ll move with you if she can come.”

“I thought you couldn’t see yourself with anyone.”

“I couldn’t,” Toph says. “Until now.” 

“We can talk about this later,” Zuko said, though he couldn’t hide his giddiness.

“Okay,” Toph said. 

They never had a chance to talk about it. In fact, he never had the chance to hear Toph’s voice ever again. 

When he pulled up to the address Toph gave him later that night, something was very wrong. In front of him was a car. Bent around a fallen tree. The sedan looked as if it had run head-on into the trunk, knocking the tree down on top of it.

Zuko opened his door and put his feet on the ground. He walked right to the front, by the tree. He looked in through the windshield. And he saw what he had both feared and yet not truly believed possible. Toph was slumped over in the passenger seat, a younger man Zuko didn’t recognize at the steering wheel. 

Everyone sort of assumes that when faced with life-and-death situations, you will panic. 

But almost everyone who’s actually experienced something like that will tell you that panic is a luxury you cannot afford. In the moment, you act without thinking, doing all you can with the information you have. It’s when it’s over that you scream. And cry. And wonder how you got through it. Because most likely, in the case of real trauma, your brain isn’t great at making memories. It’s almost as if the camera is on but no one’s recording. So afterward, you go to review the tape, and it’s all but blank.

He remembered pulling Toph out, holding her in his arms as she bled. He remembered putting her in his car, her blood all over the leather seats. He remembered that no one knew Toph was there, so she wasn’t. And he had to make sure of that. Destroy any trace of her that was there. 

When a man from the hospital staff asked him for a statement about what happened to Toph, Zuko said, “How much will it take for you to leave me alone?” He was relieved when the dollar figure was less than what he had in his wallet. Just after midnight, a doctor came into the room and told him that Toph’s femoral artery had been severed. She had lost too much blood. For a brief moment, he wondered if he could give some of his blood to Toph, if it worked like that. 

But Zuko was distracted by the next words out of the doctor’s mouth. “She won’t make it.” 

Toph was going to die. _Toph was going to die._

“Would you like to say good-bye?” She was unconscious in the bed when he walked into the room. She looked paler than normal, but they had cleaned her up a bit. There was no longer blood everywhere. He could see her beautiful face. 

“She doesn’t have long,” the doctor said. “But we can give you a moment.”

Zuko did not have the luxury of panic. So he got into the bed with her, held her hand even though it felt limp in his, even though she would never squeeze his hand again.

“If you go,” he said, “if you have to go, Toph, know that I loved you. That you were my soulmate, that I told you all my secrets. It’s you and me, Toph. Forever.”

She died an hour later. He never found out who she was in love with. 

  
  
  



	3. gave you so much (but it wasn't enough)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for suicide at the end of this chapter. it's not graphic in any way, but it's mentioned.  
> i really appreciate all the comments!! i've been wanting to write this for a while and i'm so glad you guys like it 😭

He couldn’t grieve. It didn’t feel right. Toph left a void Zuko knew he couldn’t fill with anything. He and Sokka both knew that it was time to get out of New York, just as he and Sokka both knew it wasn’t a brain aneurysm that killed Toph. He understood why it had to be handled that way, but it didn’t make it any easier. It was just another added pressure. 

“Aldiz,” Sokka said.

They hadn’t seen each other since the meeting in LA, but they spoke on the phone every night. He couldn’t speak of Toph, so they spoke about other things. He was just starting to come out of it, to see a light at the end of the tunnel, when Sokka suggested Aldiz. 

“Where is that?” 

“It’s on the southern coast of Spain. It’s a small city. I’ve talked to Katara, she’s found a position at an English language school. It’s mostly a fishing village. I don’t think anyone will care about us there.”

He knew that moving to Spain would mean losing the last physical tie he had to Toph, that he’d have no way of doing his weekly visits to her grave. But he also knew Toph would have been so mad if he blamed her for his inability to move on.

“Are any of your movies big in Spain?” He asked.

“Nothing recently,” Sokka said. “Yours?” 

“Just _Pride and Prejudice_ ,” Zuko said. “So no.” 

“Do you really think you’ll be able to handle this?” 

“No,” he said, even before he knew what Sokka was specifically talking about. “Which part do you mean?”

“Insignificance.” 

Zuko laughed. “Oh, God,” he said. “Yes. That’s about the only part I am ready for.”

_“It must be so hard. What you’re doing, telling your story, with so much honesty. I just want you to know that I admire you for it.”_

_“Don’t say that,” Zuko says. “OK? Just do me a favor, and don’t say anything like that. I know who I am. By tomorrow you will, too.”_

_“You keep saying that, but we’re all flawed. Do you really believe you’re past redemption?” He ignores her. Zuko’s golden eyes are trained on the rain hitting the window. “Zuko,” Korra manages. “Do you honestly—” He looks back suddenly, cutting her off._

_“Don’t.” His voice is dangerously calm. “Don’t say that. I know who I am, and by the end of this, you will too.”_

_She must look skeptical, because Zuko’s eyes flash with irritation. “Success is not all luck. It’s luck and being a son of a bitch. Toph taught me that. I did things I’m not proud of for the people I loved. But I'd do it again, and worse if I thought it would protect them. Trust me, you’ll regret all of this praise in the end.”_

In Spain, Zukko had more time with Sokka than he ever had before. They didn’t have film shoots or gossip columns to worry about. They were never recognized. There, he had the life he truly wanted. Zuko woke up every day seeing Sokka’s hair fanned on his pillow. He cherished every moment they had to themselves, every second they spent in each other’s arms. 

But of course, no matter how perfect the days seemed, there was one truth looming over them. Sokka was not well. His health was deteriorating. He did not have much time.

“I know I shouldn’t,” Sokka said one night as they lay together in the dark, neither of them quite ready to sleep. “But sometimes I get so mad at us for all the years we lost. For all the time we wasted.”

Zuko grabbed his hand. “I know.” He said. “Me too.”

“Why couldn’t we…. I love you so much. Why couldn’t we overcome the fights?”

“We did,” Zuko said, turning toward him. “We’re here.” 

Sokka shook his head. “But the years,” he said. 

“We’re stubborn,” Zuko said. “And we weren’t exactly given the tools to succeed. We’re both used to being the one who calls the shots. We both have a tendency to think the world revolves around us.” 

“And we’ve had to hide,” Sokka said. 

“The world hasn’t made it easy.” Zuko smiled in the dark. “I think being yourself—your true, entire self—is always going to feel like you’re swimming upstream.”

“Yes,” Sokka breathed. “You’re right.”

Zuko laughed. “I love you,” he said. “Don’t ever leave me.” 

But when Sokka said, “I love you, too. I never will,” they both knew he was making a promise he couldn’t keep. 

It was there, in that bed, in the room with the large balcony in the house by the ocean, that Zuko knew he couldn’t stand the thought of losing him again, losing Sokka in a deeper way than he’d ever lost him before. He couldn’t bear the idea that there would be a forever without Sokka, with no tie to him. “Will you marry me?” He said.

Sokka threw his head back and laughed. Zuko stopped him.

“I’m not kidding! I want to marry you. For once and for all. Don’t I deserve that? Six marriages in, shouldn’t I finally get to marry the love of my life?” 

“I don’t think it works that way, babe,” he said. “And need I remind you, I’d be stealing my sister’s husband.” 

“I’m serious, Sokka.” 

“So am I, Zuko. There’s no way for us to marry.” 

“All a marriage is is a promise.”

“If you say so,” he said. “You’re the expert.”

“Here’s what we will do,” Zuko said, trying to convince him. “We will look each other in the eye, and we will hold hands, and we will say what’s in our hearts, and we will promise to be there for each other. We don’t need any government documents or witnesses or religious approval. It doesn’t matter that I’m already legally married, because we both know that when I was marrying Katara, I was doing it to be with you. We don’t need anybody else’s rules. We just need each other.”

Sokka was quiet. Then he looked up. “Okay.” He said. “I’m in.”

“I think you should probably perform the ceremony. You have more experience.”

“That's fair,” Zuko said. “Vows?”

“”I have mine.” Sokka said it with a finality that caught him off guard.

“Go.”

“Zuko, I have been in love with you since 1959. I may not have always shown it, I may have been terrible and petty and immature, but never, for any moment, did I ever stop loving you. And I never will.” 

Zuko closed his eyes briefly, letting Sokka’s words sink in. And then he gave his. “I have been married six times, and never once have I felt with any of them what I feel with you. I’ve loved you since the first time you walked on set, with that stupid wide-eyed gaze. I think that loving you has been the truest thing about me.” Sokka smiled so hard Zuko thought he might cry. But he didn’t. Zuko said, “By the power vested in me by me, I now declare us married.”

“You may now kiss me,” Sokka said. He was so beautiful.

He let go of Sokka’s hands, grabbed his face, and kissed him. His husband.

Eight years later, after he and Sokka had spent more than a decade together on the beaches of Spain, after the world had forgotten about _Camelot_ and _Pride and Prejudice_ and Sokka’s three Oscars, Sokka Naqi died of respiratory failure.

Zuko held him in his arms as he died. Just like Toph. It was summer, the windows were wide open, but it still smelled of sickness. If you focused, if you really tried, you could smell the saltwater. 

Sokka’s eyes went still. Zuko called out for the nurse, who had been downstairs in the kitchen. He stopped making memories again, in those moments when Sokka was being taken from him. He could only remember clinging to him, holding Sokka as best he could. They never had enough time. When Sokka’s body went with the paramedics, Zuko’s soul went with it. 

He looked over at Katara. And then he fell to the floor and wept. The tiles were cold. Katara did not help him up. She got down on the floor next to him and sobbed. They were there for a long time. 

Zuko had lost him. His love. His Sokka. His soulmate. The man whose love he’d spent his life earning. Simply gone. Irrevocably and forever. He would never come back. 

Sokka was buried in the same graveyard as Toph. The funeral was held on a Tuesday, a small, private affair. Still, people knew they were there.

When he was lowered to the ground, Zuko stared at the hole in the earth. Zuko stared at the glossy sheen of the wood of Sokka’s casket. He told Katara he needed a moment and then he turned away. He walked until he found what he was looking for. Toph Beifong. He sat down at her tombstone, and He cried out everything, every single moment. He cried until he felt depleted. He did not say a single thing. He did not feel any need. Zuko had talked to Toph in his head for so long, for so many years, that it felt as if they transcended words.

Zuko let her heal him as only she could. And then he stood up, dusted off his suit, and turned around. There, in the trees, were two paparazzi taking his photo. Zuko was neither angry nor flattered. He simply didn’t care. It cost so much, caring. He didn’t have any currency to spend on it. Not anymore. Instead, he walked away.

Two weeks later, when he and Katara had returned to Aldiz, she left a magazine in his room with the image of him at Toph’s grave on the cover. She had attached a note to the front. It said, simply, “I love you.” Zuko pulled off the note and read the headline: “Legend Zuko Huo Weeps at Toph Beifong’s Grave Years Later.” 

Even long past his prime, people were still easily distracted from seeing how he felt about Sokka Naquier. But this time was different. Because he wasn’t hiding anything. The truth had been there for them to grab if they’d paid attention. He had been his truest self, searching for the help of his best friend to ease the pain of the loss of his love. But of course, they got it wrong. They never did care about getting it right. The media are going to tell whatever story they want to tell. Always have, always will. 

It was then he knew that anything true about his life could not come from anyone but him. 

He saved Katara’s note and threw the magazine in the trash.

_“I was lucky to have Katara. She lost her brother, and she still wanted to help me, in any and all ways that she could. And she did that, lovingly, until she died at age seventy-four.”_

_Zuko’s golden eyes are impossibly sad. Korra knows they’ve reached the end._

_“That was only five wives.”_

_Zuko waves his hand. “Google can tell you about the other one. All I can tell you is that this is how my story ends. With the loss of everyone I ever loved. With me, in this beautiful apartment, utterly alone. A golden prison of my own making.”_

_Korra moves to say something, but Zuko continues. “When you write the ending, Korra, tell everyone that it is the people I miss. Tell everyone that I got it wrong. That I chose the wrong things most of the time. Make sure they know that I am heartbroken without them. Spell it out if you have to. Say that Zuko Huo doesn’t care if everyone forgets his name. Better yet, remind them that Zuko Huo never existed. He was a person I made up for them. So that they would love me. Tell them that I was confused, for a very long time, about what love was. Tell them that I understand it now, and I don’t need their love anymore. That I’m going home now, to my best friend and to the love of my life. Tell them that I say goodbye.”_

_“Goodbye? Zuko, you can’t say goodbye.” That’s so final, so morose. It’s so clear what Zuko is implying, what will happen now that they’re finished._

_Zuko looks disappointed. He gets up, crosses the room to his desk. Takes out a piece of paper. It’s a photo, clearly worn. “The man in the car with Toph. The one I left.”_

_Korra takes the photo, and her vision nearly goes white with shock, shock that quickly turns to rage._

_“Toph had been talking with someone. She called them her spiritual advisor. I think he was the closest thing she had to a best friend besides me.”_

_It’s a terrible, horrible thing. Zuko’s worst moment, to be sure. But Korra isn’t sure she wouldn’t do something like that for someone she loves. For Asami. She isn’t saying she would do it. But she could imagine doing something like that._

_“Toph had pulled him off the road. His name was Aang. He died on February 28th, 1989.”_

_She had lived her entire life with the belief that Aang had chosen to leave her. That he knew he was her only role model, her only guiding light, and still drove drunk. Drove recklessly._

_“Was he drunk?” She’s surprised by how calm her voice sounds._

_Zuko looks remorseful but not exactly sorry. “No. The police decided that. No one told them otherwise.”_

_Silence. Korra can’t contain her fury._

_“You think that giving me your story makes up for any of it?” She asks. “All this time, you’ve been making me sit here, listening to your life, so that you could confess that you left the only parent I ever had for dead, and you think that your biography makes up for it?”_

_“No,” Zuko says. “I think you know me well enough by now to know I’m not nearly naive enough to believe in absolution.”_

_“What, then? Why do this?”_

_Zuko looks at her, gold eyes unreadable. “I never had the privilege of a father figure. But I always knew who my father was. I thought you deserved the same courtesy.”_

_“Courtesy?” She echos, unbelieving._

_Zuko hands her a piece of yellowed paper. She recognizes the tidy scrawl immediately._

_Toph,_

_It’s ironic that I’m writing this to you, as I’ll have to read it aloud anyway. But I needed the guide. I think you should go to Europe with Zuko. Forget about her and forget about me. Neither of us can come with you, and I think you know that. I cannot leave my daughter. She may not be mine by blood, but I am her only family._

_My family is my heart. And I cannot break us up. Not even for you, Toph. Go to Europe. If you believe it is what is best for you and Zuko. And know that here, in New York, I am thinking of you._

_Yours, Aang_

_Her hands are shaking. “So you put me through all this to assuage your guilt and make sure you got the book about your life that you wanted?”_

_Zuko shakes his head, ready to correct her, but she’s not done. “It’s amazing, really. How self-interested you can be. That even now, even when you appear to want to redeem yourself, it’s still about you.”_

_Zuko puts up his hand, and for a second, Korra sees that hungry young actor he was in Camelot, the one who fought tooth and nail for what he wanted. “Don’t act like you haven’t benefited from this. You’ve been a willing participant here. You wanted the story. You took advantage—deftly and smartly, I might add—of the position I put you in.”_

_“Zuko, seriously,” Korra says. “Cut the bullshit.”_

_“You don’t want the story?” Zuko asks, clearly challenging her. “If you don’t want it, don’t take it. Let my story die with me. Makes no difference to me.” Korra is quiet, unsure how to respond, unsure how Zuko wants her to respond. He puts out his hand, expectantly. He’s not going to let the suggestion be hypothetical. It’s not rhetorical. It demands an answer. “Go ahead,” he says. “Get your notes and the recordings. We can burn them all right now.”_

_Korra doesn’t move. Zuko nods. “That’s what I thought.”_

_“It’s the least I deserve,” Korra says, immediately defensive. “It’s the fucking least you can give me.”_

_“Nobody deserves anything,” Zuko says. “It’s simply a matter of who’s willing to go and take it for themselves. Be honest about that. No one is just a victim or a victor. Everyone is somewhere in between. People who go around casting themselves as one or the other are not only kidding themselves, but they’re also painfully unoriginal.”_

_"When can I release the book?”_

_“I won’t be around much longer,” Zuko says, sitting back down._

_And then she realizes. Zuko was never going to let anything, even death, have that sort of power. To choose for him. He is going to die when he wants to. And he wants to die now._

_“Zuko,” She says, hating the part of herself who feels bad for him. She can’t bring herself to say it or even suggest it. It sounds so absurd, even the thought of it. Zuko taking his own life._

_“Hm?” Zuko says, looking at her. He does not seem concerned or disturbed or nervous. He looks as if this is any normal day._

_Nothing,” Korra manages. The anger from mere moments ago suddenly seems so far away. She hates Zuko, but she thinks she likes him very much. She wishes he had never existed, and yet she can’t help but admire him a great deal. He’s not sure what to do with that. She gets up, turns the front doorknob. All she can manage to squeak out is the very heart of what she’s thinking. “Please take care, Zuko,” She says. The anger is gone. What’s left is a dull sort of sadness. She imagines Zuko has lived with that feeling for a long time._

_Zuko looks at her, and for one split second, She can read his expression. It is subtle, and it is fleeting. But it is there. And she knows that her suspicions are right. Zuko Huo is saying good-bye._

_“Korra,” he says. “You’re going to do great things.”_

_She manages a smile, and his golden eyes betray a hint of happiness. A final relief._

_She sits on the subway, misses her stop. Rides it until the end of the line, rides back again. Maybe it’s the motion, the subway has always soothed her, or maybe it’s the time she’s given herself to think, but she realizes that even though it is too early yet, she will, one day, forgive_ _Zuko._

_She reads about Zuko’s death in the New York Tribune’s Saturday issue. They rule his death as an accidental overdose of prescribed pain medication._ _Korra knows better. She imagines a younger Zuko, like he was in Pride and Prejudice, when he didn't have quite so much weight on his shoulders, reuniting with Sokka and Toph, people he hadn’t seen in decades. And she realizes, quite surprisingly, that she hopes he’s happy._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading.  
> if you ever wanna talk zukka, dm me on instagram @s4pphos !


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